Rockstar paid $4.5 billion for Nortel patents and has launched a major attack.

Canada-based telecom Nortel went bankrupt in 2009 and sold its biggest asset—a portfolio of more than 6,000 patents covering 4G wireless innovations and a range of technologies—at an auction in 2011.

Google bid for the patents, but it didn't get them. Instead, the patents went to a group of competitors—Microsoft, Apple, RIM, Ericsson, and Sony—operating under the name "Rockstar Bidco." The companies together bid the shocking sum of $4.5 billion.

Patent insiders knew that the Nortel portfolio was the patent equivalent of a nuclear stockpile: dangerous in the wrong hands, and a bit scary even if held by a "responsible" party.

This afternoon, that stockpile was finally used for what pretty much everyone suspected it would be used for—launching an all-out patent attack on Google and Android. The smartphone patent wars have been underway for a few years now, and the eight lawsuits filed in federal court today by Rockstar Consortium mean that the conflict just hit DEFCON 1.

Google probably knew this was coming. When it lost out in the Nortel auction, the company's top lawyer, David Drummond, complained that the Microsoft-Apple patent alliance was part of a "hostile, organized campaign against Android." Google's failure to get patents in the Nortel auction was seen as one of the driving factors in its $12.5 billion purchase of Motorola in 2011.

Rockstar, meanwhile, was pretty unapologetic about embracing the "patent troll" business model. Most trolls, of course, aren't holding thousands of patents from gigantic technology companies. When Rockstar was profiled by Wired last year, about 25 of its 32 employees were former Nortel employees.

The suits filed today are against Google and seven companies that make Android smartphones: Asustek, HTC, Huawei, LG Electronics, Pantech, Samsung, and ZTE. The case was filed in the Eastern District of Texas, long considered a district friendly to patent plaintiffs.

The lawsuits

The complaint against Google involves six patents, all from the same patent "family." They're all titled "associative search engine" and list Richard Skillen and Prescott Livermore as inventors. The patents describe "an advertisement machine which provides advertisements to a user searching for desired information within a data network."

The smartphone patent wars have been underway for a few years now, and the conflict just hit DEFCON 1.

The oldest patent in the case is US Patent No. 6,098,065, with a filing date of 1997, one year before Google was founded. The newest patent in the suit was filed in 2007 and granted in 2011.

The complaint tries to use the fact that Google bid for the patents as an extra point against the search giant. "Google subsequently increased its bid multiple times, ultimately bidding as high as $4.4 billion," wrote Rockstar's lawyers. "That price was insufficient to win the auction, as a group led by the current shareholders of Rockstar purchased the portfolio for $4.5 billion. Despite losing in its attempt to acquire the patents-in-suit at auction, Google has infringed and continues to infringe the patents-in-suit."

The suits against the six manufacturing companies each assert the same patents—either six or seven of them, depending on the target. The patents cover a variety of innovations and have different inventors. One patent filed in 1997 for a "navigation tool for graphical user interface" describes a way of navigating through electronic documents. Another describes an "Internet protocol filter," and a third patent describes an "integrated message center."

The manufacturer lawsuits name the targets' whole array of smartphones and tablets. The lawsuit against Huawei, for instance, claims the infringing products include "the Huawei M865 MUVE, Huawei Ascend II, and Huawei Premia 4G M931, and Huawei’s family of tablets, including but not limited to the Huawei MediaPad and Huawei IDEOS S7 Slim."

Rockstar has employed two different law firms to file the suits; both firms have patent experience and experience litigating in the Eastern District of Texas. The Google search suit is being handled by Susman Godfrey, which has taken on other sue-the-world patent cases, like Paul Allen's lawsuits against Facebook, Google, and others.

The manufacturer suits, meanwhile, are being handled by McKool Smith, a formidable Texas law firm that has probably wrung more massive verdicts out of tech companies than any other firm. It scored $368 million from Apple for VirnetX, $290 million from Microsoft over i4i's XML patent, and most recently notched a $173 million verdict against Qualcomm.

The ultimate “patent privateer”

When Wired visited Rockstar's Ontario headquarters, it found 10 reverse-engineering experts, working daily to take apart products and find patent infringement. With just a few dozen employees, Rockstar is hoping to convince more than 100 technology companies to pay it patent licensing fees for a huge array of products. "Pretty much anyone out there is infringing," said Rockstar's CEO, John Veschi.

The Rockstar Consortium may be the ultimate example of patent "privateering"—when big companies hand off their patents to small shell companies to do the dirty work of suing their competitors. Essentially, it's patent trolling gone corporate.

The "privateering" phenomenon has long irked Google. In February, when Google filed a patent lawsuit against British Telecom, it said one of the reasons for the suit was that BT had not only sued Google directly, but it had also gone around "arming patent trolls."

Part of Rockstar's strategy is avoiding a patent countersuit by not having any operating businesses. Essentially, the company wants to enjoy the same advantage patent trolls have, even though it's owned by direct Google competitors like Apple and Microsoft.

"The principals have plausible deniability," said Thomas Ewing, an IP attorney who spoke to Wired about Rockstar. "They can say with a straight face: ‘They’re an independent company. We don’t control them.’ And there’s some truth to that."

And Rockstar's CEO was quite straightforward about his belief that whatever promises Microsoft and Apple might have made about how they'll use their patents, those promises don't apply to Rockstar. “We are separate,” he says. “That does not apply to us.”

Rockstar may want to keep the patent conflict as a kind of "proxy war" between Google and its competitors. But Google has plenty of patents, and this new attack seems assured to bring a counterattack.

The smartphone market is more valuable than ever, and the $4.5 billion Rockstar purchase shows that Google's competitors will spare no expense to put a damper on Android, and they hope to make money while they do it. Patents have become the arena in which tech companies have chosen to do battle. Six years after the iPhone and five years after the launch of Android, the stakes keep getting raised.

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Or the fact that it would cause Google to lose their competitive edge: Google holds 81% of the smartphone market share. This is a direct result of Android's prevalence across such a wide variety of devices. If Google got in on the patent deal with Rockstar, et al., they would lose that diversity that has gained them the market share.

How they would lose that diversity forming part of the patent deal?

If the Android OS was identical across all devices, what would be the point? Google's business would dry up like the Salton Sea. Google won the market share they did by allowing such diversity. When I could afford a smart phone, my options were a ~$100 Huawei Android or the ~$200 iPhone 4.

But being part of the pool that bought the patents doesn't mean that all the Android phones must be the same

Or the fact that it would cause Google to lose their competitive edge: Google holds 81% of the smartphone market share. This is a direct result of Android's prevalence across such a wide variety of devices. If Google got in on the patent deal with Rockstar, et al., they would lose that diversity that has gained them the market share.

How they would lose that diversity forming part of the patent deal?

If the Android OS was identical across all devices, what would be the point? Google's business would dry up like the Salton Sea. Google won the market share they did by allowing such diversity. When I could afford a smart phone, my options were a ~$100 Huawei Android or the ~$200 iPhone 4.

But being part of the pool that bought the patents doesn't mean that all the Android phones must be the same

To save themselves in the licencing front would indeed mean exactly that. They'd have to really standardize the Android OS across the board to make the investment via licencing. Google is already edging out 3rd party apps at an alarming rate (relevant), SMS and MMS is the latest casualty.

Then there is the part where Google was asked to join the Rockstar group in their bid for the Nortel patents and refused to do so, preferring to bid for them on their own.

I addressed that on this same page of replies. That was just posturing just read it back. Don't fall for it, you are blindly repeating what they (MS, Apple et al) want people to remember.

Would you pay for something, knowing you get no benefit from it, not even indirect as protection from lawsuits?

The "benefit" they wanted to get by not going with the others was the ability to sue them into oblivion. The others offer was basically to neutralize the patents for those that participated. Google didn't want neutral patents. They wanted them as a club.

Exactly.

A huge coalition formed to share the costs of purchasing the patents to take them out of play, and Google refused to take part as a member of that coalition.

Instead, they tried to get them all for themselves and use them as a weapon just as they used standards essential patents they acquired from Motorola as a weapon.

Now they want to pretend they are the victim here?

Sorry, but if it's acceptable for Google to attack others with standards essential patents, it's perfectly acceptable to go after Google with patents that are not under FRAND restrictions.

And you just stepped into the realm of complete bullshit. Google has not used its patents offensively if any of those cases.

Quote:

Microsoft has won another key courtroom victory in its landmark patent case against Google’s Motorola Mobility division.

A federal jury in Seattle late Wednesday found that Motorola failed to license its standards-essential patents related to the H.264 video standard and the 802.11 wireless standard on FRAND (fair, reasonable and nondiscriminatory) terms, in breach of its industry obligation to do so. And it awarded Microsoft about $14.5 million in damages for Motorola’s misstep.

That’s only about half of what Microsoft sought. But, taken together with the ruling from the first stage of the case, which found that Microsoft should pay only $1.8 million a year in licensing fees for the patents Motorola was demanding $4 billion for, it’s a precedent-setting victory and an embarrassing blow to Google.

“This is a landmark win for all who want products that are affordable and work well together,” David Howard, Microsoft deputy general counsel, said in an statement. “The jury’s verdict is the latest in a growing list of decisions by regulators and courts telling Google to stop abusing patents.”

As I said, an embarrassing blow to Google. Not only does the verdict call into question the wisdom of the company’s $12.5 billion acquisition of Motorola Mobility, it has made it possible for a rival like Microsoft to publicly lambaste it as a patent troll. Accurately. And there may be further fallout yet.

The patent system probably added more value 200 years ago when the dissemination of knowledge was not nearly as easy, cheap or volumuinous as it is today. This is due, of course, to many technological improvements.

Looking at this situation from a very meta- perspective, I find it fascinating that what's effectively happening now is that the patent system is undermining the very technological forces that have made it less relevant. It's not unlike watching two different species compete against each other in nature.

And Rockstar's CEO was quite straightforward about his belief that whatever promises Microsoft and Apple might have made about how they'll use their patents, those promises don't apply to Rockstar. “We are separate,” he says. “That does not apply to us.”

I'll believe that when Rockstar sues Apple and Microsoft for violating the same patents.

The prevailing views above on patients seems to be that "methods" should not be patentable, and possibly because the commenters view "ideas as cheap" and the value is in the actual software development.

Many of the programmers among you are probably familiar with the Scrum agile framework, developed by Ken Schwaber and Jeff Sutherland. This is a method or business process. There is a substantial investment of their intellectual horse power, time in research and testing across industry's, and evolving the framework over many years. If you develop a "piece of code" and commercially sell it to support the running of this framework, would you really think you did all the hard work?

GTD - "get things done" by David Allen. A framework for becoming more organised and effective/efficient. Again, extensive research into how the brain works in this context, coupled with building and testing processes and systems. Is the hard work really only in building a software program that implements this?

I'm not advocating that all method based patents are valid. To say that they have no value and shouldn't be protectable however is not beneficial to innovation.

This is disgusting. The actions of these companies have reached a new low. Apple, Microsoft, Sony, RIM, and Ericsson are despicable.

The system is so broken it is ridiculous, but I guess the government is going to continue to let billions upon billions of dollars go to waste over this bullshit. Shit does roll downhill, so ultimately, who do you think is impacted by these major decisions? The consumer.

So, Google stealing IP is fine. Whether it's patents, videos and music, or books it's all fine. Since they fill your freebie trough for you. Grow up and make something of value. Your life will be far better than bleating for handouts from Google.

"Thus, what is of supreme importance in war is to attack the enemy's strategy." - Sun Tzu The Art of War

It is evident that Rockstar is employing this aphorism. Whether they win the war remains to be seen.

On a side note when Bill Gates appeared during a Steve Jobs keynote in 1997 and announced Microsoft was investing $150 million in Apple, that may have been the first deal when Apple and Microsoft cross-licensed all of their patents. Since then peace has reigned between Apple and Microsoft and they use their patents to go after other competitors. Maybe this was the most important thing behind Bill Gates "saving" Apple?

The prevailing views above on patients seems to be that "methods" should not be patentable, and possibly because the commenters view "ideas as cheap" and the value is in the actual software development.

Many of the programmers among you are probably familiar with the Scrum agile framework, developed by Ken Schwaber and Jeff Sutherland. This is a method or business process. There is a substantial investment of their intellectual horse power, time in research and testing across industry's, and evolving the framework over many years. If you develop a "piece of code" and commercially sell it to support the running of this framework, would you really think you did all the hard work?

GTD - "get things done" by David Allen. A framework for becoming more organised and effective/efficient. Again, extensive research into how the brain works in this context, coupled with building and testing processes and systems. Is the hard work really only in building a software program that implements this?

I'm not advocating that all method based patents are valid. To say that they have no value and shouldn't be protectable however is not beneficial to innovation.

Agile/Scrum and GTD are not patented. The books by their developers are copyrighted, and that's how they make their money. Given that copyright lasts far longer than patent, I'd say that's the proper way to monetize a new method.

Then there is the part where Google was asked to join the Rockstar group in their bid for the Nortel patents and refused to do so, preferring to bid for them on their own.

I addressed that on this same page of replies. That was just posturing just read it back. Don't fall for it, you are blindly repeating what they (MS, Apple et al) want people to remember.

Would you pay for something, knowing you get no benefit from it, not even indirect as protection from lawsuits?

The "benefit" they wanted to get by not going with the others was the ability to sue them into oblivion. The others offer was basically to neutralize the patents for those that participated. Google didn't want neutral patents. They wanted them as a club.

How do we know that Google didn't want them so they couldn't be used against Google?

Competition by lawyer, rather than giving users a chance to decide in the market place. Somebody - Microsoft, Apple, and others of that ilk, are running scared. The whole patent - and product design registration - edifice is an unmitigated disaster ; it's about time it was razed and we started over....

No matter the outcome of the trial, I pretty much have lost respect for any of the companies involved with Rockstar. Instead of trying to fairly compete against Google, they try to win via litigation.

It's so damn scummy.

Yup, that's what profit-maximizing corporations do - maximize profit.

Ironically, Google was invited to join the group, but declined to do so because it would have prevented them from offensively using that patents against the other members (Microsoft, Apple, and RIM). Even I have to admit that Google has no one to blame but themselves here.

So, Google stealing IP is fine. Whether it's patents, videos and music, or books it's all fine. Since they fill your freebie trough for you. Grow up and make something of value. Your life will be far better than bleating for handouts from Google.

No matter the outcome of the trial, I pretty much have lost respect for any of the companies involved with Rockstar. Instead of trying to fairly compete against Google, they try to win via litigation.

It's so damn scummy.

Yes, damn these companies trying to protect intellectual property that they legally purchased.

Before reading through all of the replies in this comment thread. I'm sure that others have said this, and if I'm not the first, I will gladly lead the race. But these companies are stifling innovation by using patents that essentially patent processes and algorithms that are common place.

No matter the outcome of the trial, I pretty much have lost respect for any of the companies involved with Rockstar. Instead of trying to fairly compete against Google, they try to win via litigation.

It's so damn scummy.

Read the linked article, they asked Google to join their group and Google declined. That's not specifically targeting Android as the article states, if it was they wouldn't have invited Google to join them...

You know, I totally apologize. When I read it on my mobile browser, I totally thought Apple was singled out, and MS wasn't mentioned and I knew otherwise from other news sources. I don't know if it was me (it was) or the browser (don't think so), but in either case, it was wrong and I shouldn't have posted that.

I'll go eat crow (lunch) and read harder (the irony is that we complain at work how nobody reads anything anymore).

No. The first thing to do is stop purchasing the product of the companies that pay the lawyers to commit these atrocities. And convince everyone you can to do the same. Simply educate them. The fact that you can't sit down at your computer anymore and write successful system code without Microsoft and Apple setting up software-patent troll shell companies to cost you millions of dollars just shows how bad things have become. Microsoft started this a long time ago by threatening to sue open source and Linux over software-patents in order to maintain a lock on the marketplace. They started approaching companies SCO style to pay for a Linux patent license which is has now expanded to Android. Apple jumped aboard because they are losing to Android in the market share war. Its a really sleazy egregious tactic.

Then there is the part where Google was asked to join the Rockstar group in their bid for the Nortel patents and refused to do so, preferring to bid for them on their own.

I addressed that on this same page of replies. That was just posturing just read it back. Don't fall for it, you are blindly repeating what they (MS, Apple et al) want people to remember.

Would you pay for something, knowing you get no benefit from it, not even indirect as protection from lawsuits?

The "benefit" they wanted to get by not going with the others was the ability to sue them into oblivion. The others offer was basically to neutralize the patents for those that participated. Google didn't want neutral patents. They wanted them as a club.

How do we know that Google didn't want them so they couldn't be used against Google?

Because if that's what they wanted, it would have been cheaper to share the cost of acquiring them with everyone else in the consortium.

The only reason to insist on buying them by yourself is so that you can use them as a weapon against everybody else.

Competition by lawyer, rather than giving users a chance to decide in the market place. Somebody - Microsoft, Apple, and others of that ilk, are running scared. The whole patent - and product design registration - edifice is an unmitigated disaster ; it's about time it was razed and we started over....

Henri

Using money from advertising to fund billions into an OS operating system and giving it away for "free" is not competing. It is disrupting and actually illegal.

Then there is the part where Google was asked to join the Rockstar group in their bid for the Nortel patents and refused to do so, preferring to bid for them on their own.

I addressed that on this same page of replies. That was just posturing just read it back. Don't fall for it, you are blindly repeating what they (MS, Apple et al) want people to remember.

Would you pay for something, knowing you get no benefit from it, not even indirect as protection from lawsuits?

The "benefit" they wanted to get by not going with the others was the ability to sue them into oblivion. The others offer was basically to neutralize the patents for those that participated. Google didn't want neutral patents. They wanted them as a club.

How do we know that Google didn't want them so they couldn't be used against Google?

Because if that's what they wanted, it would have been cheaper to share the cost of acquiring them with everyone else in the consortium.

The only reason to insist on buying them by yourself is so that you can use them as a weapon against everybody else.

As has been stated numerous times in this very discussion, the other reason is that if they had joined the consortium, it would have left their handset manufacturers vulnerable.

Then there is the part where Google was asked to join the Rockstar group in their bid for the Nortel patents and refused to do so, preferring to bid for them on their own.

I addressed that on this same page of replies. That was just posturing just read it back. Don't fall for it, you are blindly repeating what they (MS, Apple et al) want people to remember.

Would you pay for something, knowing you get no benefit from it, not even indirect as protection from lawsuits?

The "benefit" they wanted to get by not going with the others was the ability to sue them into oblivion. The others offer was basically to neutralize the patents for those that participated. Google didn't want neutral patents. They wanted them as a club.

How do we know that Google didn't want them so they couldn't be used against Google?

Because if that's what they wanted, it would have been cheaper to share the cost of acquiring them with everyone else in the consortium.

The only reason to insist on buying them by yourself is so that you can use them as a weapon against everybody else.

One patent filed in 1997, for a "navigation tool for graphical user interface," describes a way of navigating through electronic documents. Another describes an "Internet protocol filter," and a third patent describes an "integrated message center."

Competition by lawyer, rather than giving users a chance to decide in the market place. Somebody - Microsoft, Apple, and others of that ilk, are running scared. The whole patent - and product design registration - edifice is an unmitigated disaster ; it's about time it was razed and we started over....

Henri

Using money from advertising to fund billions into an OS operating system and giving it away for "free" is not competing. It is disrupting and actually illegal.

It may be disrupting (that could be a good thing) but it's hardly illegal. Giving away a product for 'free' breaks no laws.

Then there is the part where Google was asked to join the Rockstar group in their bid for the Nortel patents and refused to do so, preferring to bid for them on their own.

I addressed that on this same page of replies. That was just posturing just read it back. Don't fall for it, you are blindly repeating what they (MS, Apple et al) want people to remember.

Would you pay for something, knowing you get no benefit from it, not even indirect as protection from lawsuits?

The "benefit" they wanted to get by not going with the others was the ability to sue them into oblivion. The others offer was basically to neutralize the patents for those that participated. Google didn't want neutral patents. They wanted them as a club.

How do we know that Google didn't want them so they couldn't be used against Google?

Because if that's what they wanted, it would have been cheaper to share the cost of acquiring them with everyone else in the consortium.

The only reason to insist on buying them by yourself is so that you can use them as a weapon against everybody else.

As has been stated numerous times in this very discussion, the other reason is that if they had joined the consortium, it would have left their handset manufacturers vulnerable.

You can state nonsensical reasons as much as you like. They just don't have any relevance to the discussion.

Then there is the part where Google was asked to join the Rockstar group in their bid for the Nortel patents and refused to do so, preferring to bid for them on their own.

I addressed that on this same page of replies. That was just posturing just read it back. Don't fall for it, you are blindly repeating what they (MS, Apple et al) want people to remember.

Would you pay for something, knowing you get no benefit from it, not even indirect as protection from lawsuits?

The "benefit" they wanted to get by not going with the others was the ability to sue them into oblivion. The others offer was basically to neutralize the patents for those that participated. Google didn't want neutral patents. They wanted them as a club.

How do we know that Google didn't want them so they couldn't be used against Google?

Because if that's what they wanted, it would have been cheaper to share the cost of acquiring them with everyone else in the consortium.

The only reason to insist on buying them by yourself is so that you can use them as a weapon against everybody else.

So it's an assumption on your part. Thanks.

So if you and your friends go out for pizza, paying for everything yourself is cheaper than splitting the tab?

As has been stated numerous times in this very discussion, the other reason is that if they had joined the consortium, it would have left their handset manufacturers vulnerable.

You can state nonsensical reasons as much as you like. They just don't have any relevance to the discussion.

How is that a nonsensical reason? They didn't want to join a group who would then be attacking third party companies that make their product viable. That doesn't sound nonsensical, that sounds like proper motivation.

Of course, I guess it is easier to just say everything that you don't like is nonsensical than acknowledge you have no idea what you are talking about.

Why do mac/linux/windows have an arrow for a pointer? isn't that a violation of some patent?

Seriously, if someone builds a boat, and I can replicate that same boat without looking at his/her designs, methods of construction etc. how is it that he can have a patent for that boat?

I don't know, that sounds like a philosophical conversation, and one to be taken seriously in the courts.

All we know right now, is that Google is infringing and will be (rightfully) in deep crap for it. That's the way it goes. You respect the patent system or you get dragged into court. That's the way it is.

If there's some pie in the sky idea on how to make the planet a better place, cool. But in reality there's nowhere for Google and their unpaid legion of lemmings to run.

Your tone seems genuine. But judging from the comments here eg. FRAND, the anti-patent crowd consists of a bunch of diehard Google fanboys who lap up whatever crap they pour out today.

As someone who has worked hard for years and is a patent-holder, I'm definitely not on Google's side. This 'free' and open talk about Android is a bunch of noise too. If you want free and open install gNewSense, not Android.Google being butthurt about having to obey the law is going to end poorly for them.

What we know right now is that Google has been accused of infringing. It's up to the courts/jury to decide if that's the case.

It sounds to me like you are probably just as big an Apple fanboy as other people on here are Google fanboy.

And the fact that you are a patent-holder makes you a little bit biased, don't ya think?

Most people defend what they own. I have a GS3 that I use because I need 4G + Voice at the same time to do my (dev) work remotely. It's OK. Doesn't change the facts here or how I think about it. Disclaimer: I also have an iOS device. ATV G2 jailbroken to run XBMC. The wife has a 4S. I like the 4S build quality/form factor than mine. I could only use an iPhone for my work if it were on ATT (which my GS3 is), as it at least supports 3G + voice.

But lets not try to roast patent holders. If you didn't get awarded the patent, there's no room to cry about it and pretend the world now needs to fit your (infringing) world-view. Patents were a good thing, until Google came along. Now everyone just doesn't see the point anymore! Nice, and convenient.

As has been stated numerous times in this very discussion, the other reason is that if they had joined the consortium, it would have left their handset manufacturers vulnerable.

You can state nonsensical reasons as much as you like. They just don't have any relevance to the discussion.

How is that a nonsensical reason? They didn't want to join a group who would then be attacking third party companies that make their product viable. That doesn't sound nonsensical, that sounds like proper motivation.

Of course, I guess it is easier to just say everything that you don't like is nonsensical than acknowledge you have no idea what you are talking about.

How does Google's participation or non participation change the participation in the pool of others?